I was thinking that after I learn enough grammar I'd need a way to seriously expand my vocabulary. I could read manga or a book I guess. But is there a better way of learning vocabulary? Tips, advice welcomed.

Words worth learning are:1) Words in a Japanese textbook. BecauseA. They're carefully selected common words andB. They will be on the test2) Words you hear or read. Because if you're reading the word, chances are you will see the word again sometime. Furthermore, authors have their pet vocabulary. If you read works by the same author, you'll see the same words over and over.

Now that you know words you need to learn, how should you learn them?

1. With or without sentences? I don't know, I just work here. I'm not sure where exactly you find example sentences. WWWJDIC has some, but those are not well-checked (or something). Look in the source material for the sentence it came from. If you don't understand that sentence...I can't really help you.

hyperconjugated wrote:It does come off as a rather rude behaviour, doesn't it. It's not even a netiquette issue but a simple common courtesy.

And eventually what happens is that people start to notice the habit and stop bothering to reply altogether. Then somebody new to the site comes along, sees the thread, and thinks we are either unable or unwilling to be helpful. If he wants to offer up one-sided observations, that is what blogs are for.

That's the third (If memory serves) recent thread in which I've seen this behavior. What others mistook for my cynicism turned out to be prescience.

Below are links to thirty-six threads he has started and abandoned, giving not a single indication if he ever even checked back for replies. I can easily believe I am the first person here to open up his mouth and say anything about it, but I can't believe I am the only person to have noticed it. There is a small cadre of people kindly answering his questions and getting ignored for their troubles.

He doesn't treat this like a discussion forum. We're his hump-n-dump language learning booty call.

In my opinion, participating in forums should include simple etiquette such as Greet, Rapport, Ask questions, Show interest and appreciation, Listen and Follow up. Interacting in the language forums requires both parties to take an interest in, solicit the needs and opinions, follow up with comments. People like to interact with people they like, and it takes time to get to like someone. I hope members will try their very best to interact with people who care to help/reply, feel free to clarify or discuss further should you still have doubts in mind, if not, at least show a friendly gesture by a simple "Thanks". Let each post be engaging and memorable.

I don't know ... Perhaps there comes a time where people realize it is time to back down instead of speaking up? I sometimes don't even understand why I care so much for this forum, particularly this forum, I guess I'm still loving this forum very very much and I'm missing the regulars as I don't see them often these days. You have every freedom to condemn me or hex me, I have my thoughts on this too.

Before I met Coco san and some other nice people in TJP, I have no idea what forums are all about, as I don't spend much time online. I have to say, throughout these years, studying in TJP have been a pleasant experience. I imagine most of our regulars here are leading a very meaningful, educational, busy and healthy life, even though they hardly participate lately, they have left us with many useful and insightful materials. The more I review the old postings, the more I'm feeling grateful, as always they are excellent teachers who have patience and who show an initiative to educate learners to the best of their ability. They are willing to go through tricky questions and to spend as much time as needed to thoroughly explain important issues. Admiringly, they are bubbly and humble, never self-obsessed. Both regulars and moderators are doing a great job.

I extremely hate sock puppetry, but I do understand the need to create different usernames at times. (Not saying the OP is a sock puppet). Being a newbie before, I understand the urge of advancing a foreign language by asking lots of lots questions. One little thing I can't understand is that, what drives a person to participate in a particular forum? I don't know much about people who like to sabotage, create sock puppets, have nothing better to do or just enjoy spending days fooling others on the forums, I just want to say, whatever motives you may have in participating, if it doesn't benefit you, you are the one in the dark, not others, or perhaps you're already very advanced in your study, you just enjoy posting leisurely and moving away from discussion from time to time, I guess you have every right to do so as well.

I don't even mind if there is no expression of thanks, although that is the bare minimum one should expect in civilized discourse. I'd be happy if there were any indication he ever came back and checked for replies. There is no point in anyone wasting their time to answer a specific question when, for all we know, the OP never even sees the answers. I can think of better uses of my time.

And I do believe there are other "What are good ways to learn vocabulary?" threads among his earlier abandoned threads, which makes this one all that much more irksome.

I'm very very sorry. I'm a baka because I'm to stupid to reply to my posts I feel really bad about it, since I was banned for a day I guess it really was serious. I apologize for stupid discourtesy I will reply to all my posts from now on thanks to all the people that replied to all my previous posts I didn't reply to, もう一度、ごめんなさい。 I hope you guys aren't too mad.

kentaku_sama wrote:I'm very very sorry. I'm a baka because I'm to stupid to reply to my posts I feel really bad about it, since I was banned for a day I guess it really was serious. I apologize for stupid discourtesy I will reply to all my posts from now on thanks to all the people that replied to all my previous posts I didn't reply to, もう一度、ごめんなさい。 I hope you guys aren't too mad. :(

I can't speak for others, but I am not mad at you. I was exasperated and perplexed, but not mad. You pose good questions and bring up some good things to talk about and it is nice to have that sort of activity going on here. I hope you'll continue in this and I look forward to your future posts.

If you've learned your lesson and you're going to reply to your other posts, I'm not mad at you either. As Mike said, it's frustrating when you write a response to a post and there's no response, but since you know now, you can avoid that in the future.